This collection of media releases, spanning from late August to mid-December 2025, covers the ongoing efforts to conserve the endangered Maugean skate and the increasing public and shareholder scrutiny directed at major Australian supermarkets over their sourcing of salmon from the skate’s only habitat, Macquarie Harbour.
It includes perspectives from the Madeleine Ogilvie, Minister for Environment, Conservation Organisations (Neighbours of Fish Farming, Bob Brown Foundation), a Youth Conservationist, a Tasmanian Aboriginal Leader and Scientific Experts (IMAS), revealing a complex and escalating conservation challenge.
Media release – Madeleine Ogilvie, Minister for Environment, 11 December 2025
New tanks boost efforts to conserve the Maugean skate
Conservation efforts to protect the endangered Maugean skate continue to deliver success, with a new facility built to support the captive management program.
The facility, run by the University of Tasmania’s Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies (IMAS), was established as part of the Tasmanian Government’s Conservation Action Plan for the Maugean skate.
Minister for Environment Madeleine Ogilvie said the plan outlines a comprehensive and coordinated approach to ensure the future of the species.
“The Tasmanian Government is firmly committed to protecting and managing our threatened species, investing significant funding and in-kind support for a range of conservation actions, including establishing a captive management program,” Ogilvie said.
“IMAS has successfully established a captive population of adults, juveniles and eggs laid in captivity. This is a huge step forward and I congratulate all the scientists who have worked on this program.
“These new tanks will expand IMAS’s ability to house the juveniles that have hatched and are growing rapidly.
“In December 2023, eggs were collected from the wild and today there are 21 juveniles that are thriving in the new facility.
“While our ultimate goal is to translocate captive animals back to the wild, there is further work needed before we can reach that goal.”
As with any captive animal program, and in nature, not all animals will survive and thrive, however, every animal provides important information to improve our understanding of this endangered species.
“One of the learnings that has come out of the captive management program is just how quickly the juveniles grow and mature in captivity,” IMAS Maugean Skate Research Program leader, Professor Jayson Semmens said.
“As such, we designed this new facility to provide very large tanks that could house our largest animals and accommodate their rapid growth, while also allowing additional holding capacity going forward. A bespoke facility like this crucial to our efforts in this program.”
NRE Tas continues to work closely with the Australian Government, scientific experts, relevant stakeholders and the National Recovery Team for Maugean skate to recover the species.
“In good news, monitoring in 2024 recorded an increase in the wild population of Maugean skate but a number of threats remain,” Ogilvie said.
“The Tasmanian Government has invested $8 million over four years through the Threatened Species Fund to directly support conservation activities for priority species, including the Maugean skate, to further contribute to safeguarding its future.”
The Maugean skate is known only from Macquarie Harbour on Tasmania’s west coast and listed as endangered under both the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 and Tasmania’s Threatened Species Protection Act 1995.
Media release – Madeleine Ogilvie, Minister for Environment, 20 November 2025
Grants available to help safeguard Tasmania’s threatened species
Applications for round two of the Threatened Species Partnership Grant Program will open on Friday.
Minister for Environment Madeleine Ogilvie said the Tasmanian Government continues to support the vital work of conservation organisations to help protect our threatened species.
“We are delivering for Tasmania by investing $8 million over four years into the Threatened Species Fund, directly supporting conservation activities for priority species,” Ogilvie said.
“We’re already seeing great environmental outcomes from the seven grant recipients from round one and we look forward to seeing the positive impacts that will come from round two.
“Our Government is working together with conservation groups to move our state forward.”
Round one recipient, the Tasmanian Land Conservancy, was awarded $88,000 to restore natural water flows to Sloping Main Conservation Area on the Tasman Peninsula.
Historic farming and hydrology infrastructure at the site had resulted in changes to the movement of freshwater and tidal flows, impacting the natural vegetation structure.
The project helped reverse these impacts, allowing natural inundation patterns to return and the re-establishment of saltmarsh vegetation which supports the many species that call the saltmarsh home.
Following successful remediation works, birdlife has already been seen returning to the marsh.
“This is an example of how targeted investments can transform the environmental health of our landscapes,” Ogilvie said.
“This investment builds on the significant funding already provided by the Tasmanian Government to support threatened species, including to establish a captive breeding program for the Maugean skate, support for the swift parrot and upgrades to the Orange-bellied Parrot captive breeding facility.”
The Tasmanian Government’s Threatened Species Fund was launched on 7 September 2024, to coincide with National Threatened Species Day.
Media release – NOFF Media Release, 11 November 2025
‘Clean up your salmon supply’, Coles told by Aboriginal, youth, scientist and Tasmanian voices at shareholder AGM
At today’s Coles Annual General Meeting in Melbourne, the company was questioned by shareholders over the hypocrisy in continuing to source salmon from Tasmania’s Macquarie Harbour, risking the extinction of the endangered Maugean Skate.
Shareholders with deep connections to the skate’s survival, including science, youth and Aboriginal voices, travelled interstate to the AGM. Shareholders urged Coles not to tie themselves and their investors to the extinction of this endangered species.
Prominent Tasmanian organisations Neighbours of Fish Farming and Environment Tasmania, with ethical share trading platform SIX, had co-filed shareholder resolutions to the company earlier this year.
While Coles has taken some steps in the right direction to recognise the serious harm the skate faces, the company is failing to match their words with concrete action.
This year the company quietly removed the “responsibly sourced” labels from their own-brand Tasmanian salmon, which includes salmon from Macquarie Harbour.
This seems to be a concession that contributing to the potential extinction of a prehistoric creature cannot be considered “responsible” business.
Yet Coles continues to source salmon from the Harbour, being one of the industry’s biggest customers alongside Australia’s other supermarket giant, Woolworths.
Two weeks ago, 34% of Woolworths shareholders defied the board and voted in support of shareholder resolutions aimed at ending the company’s contribution to the potential extinction of the 60-million year old Maugean skate.
This was the highest global vote for a nature-based shareholder resolution in 2025.
Lilly Henley, marine campaigner at Neighbours of Fish Farming said:
“Though Coles is making some progress, Tasmania’s salmon industry is still expanding – in part because of business with Coles. Coles talks about being a company that values responsibility and community, but continuing to sell salmon from Macquarie Harbour – the only home of the endangered Maugean Skate shows that these values end at the checkout. It’s not enough to remove a label; they need to remove the product. Coles has a choice: stand with the industry, or with the people and places of Tasmania.”
Jess Coughlan, campaigner at Environment Tasmania said:
“This creature has survived since Gondwana. It has lived through ice ages – and yet, it may not survive Coles’ supply chains. Coles has an opportunity here to emerge as a leader and boost its environmental credentials, but the board is stalling on decisive action to source its seafood responsibly, away from Macquarie Harbour. Shoppers deserve better than to be served up complicity in extinction.”
Spencer Hitchen, photographer and youth conservationist said:
“I am standing here on behalf of my generation, on behalf of the youth. Macquarie Harbour is an incredible place. Coles, if you want to turn this around, to have these waters be healthy for future generations, you do have the power to do so.”
Lyndon O’Neil, Palawa man and founder of Health Country Services and Consulting said:
“The Maugen skate cannot survive if we continue to support its demise. As a company with strong ties to the Tasmanian community, we carry a responsibility to the waters and landscapes that gave rise to our brand. Coles has positioned itself as a leader in responsible sourcing and sustainability. If we continue to sell salmon farmed from Macquarie Harbour, we undermine that promise.”
Media release – Bob Brown Foundation, 26 August 2025
Nature law reform taken over by big business
Australia’s nature law reform has been hijacked by big business, which will be a calamity for the environment, says the environmental organisation Bob Brown Foundation.
“Current federal legislation would work swiftly and well if the nation had a minister prepared to abide by its ethos of protecting the environment. In Tasmania, we are currently witnessing the ongoing logging of ancient forests, which is exempt from national environmental laws. Meanwhile, we are awaiting the looming approvals from Murray Watt, who refuses to meet with our organisation. Two looming decisions in the coming days are for the destruction of Takayna rainforests for a mine waste dump and the Robbins Island windfarm proposed for the southern end of one of the world’s most vital migratory bird routes,” said Jenny Weber, Bob Brown Foundation’s Campaigns Manager.
“Last week’s economic reform roundtable has set a course for Australia’s failing environment laws to be rushed through parliament for the benefit of corporations and industrial developments. Albanese and Watt are promising faster and simpler project approvals for developments, at the expense of endangered species and nature,” said Weber.
“Under pressure from those profiteering from nature’s destruction, the government will expect environmental delegates to wilt. We are calling for unremitting defence of nature and wildlife in this time of climate and extinction emergencies. A perfect example is abolishing the exemption from environment laws for native forest logging, which must be non-negotiable,” said Weber.
“Labor already has shown that they will gut Australia’s environment laws for big corporations when they rushed to change the law to protect toxic fish farms in Macquarie Harbour, condemning the endangered Maugean Skate to extinction,” said Alistair Allan, Marine Campaigner with Bob Brown Foundation.
“If Labor are serious about new nature laws, they should also repeal that disgraceful, rushed law immediately, and write laws that protect nature, not corporations,” said Allan.
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